After her first two years as a USC Trojan, Maggie D’Innocenzo will take her talents to Austin, TX, to compete for the University of Texas. Her older brother, Nick, swam at Texas and helped them to win their NCAA title back in 2010. She has already used up two years of eligibility and will enroll as a junior at Texas. The Longhorns finished 7th overall at the 2015 NCAA Championships– one point ahead of the Trojans.
D’Innocenzo, who hails from Andover, MA, and swam club for Crimson Aquatics before swimming for the Trojans, is a versatile, distance-oriented weapon who specializes in IM and butterfly. In her first year at USC, she won the B final in the 400 IM (4:15.07) at the Pac-12 Championships, adding 16th and 17th place finishes in the 200 IM (2:01.80) and 200 fly (1:58.14), respectively. She then jumped up to a 4th place finish in the 400 IM this year as a sophomore, posting a lifetime best of 4:13.95 in the process. She also finished 14th in the 200 IM (2:01.05/2:00.48p) and 10th in the 200 fly (1:58.06).
Texas Head Coach Carol Capitani:
“We are really excited to have Maggie join us. She will be a strong addition to our team and will add valuable leadership in and out of the pool. We were sorry to miss out on her the first time around and are fortunate to be a part of her last two seasons of eligibility.”
With two of the Longhorns’ best IMers from the 2014-15 season, Kaitlin Pawlowicz and Gretchen Jaques, already graduated, D’Innocenzo will certainly help fill the hole they leave behind. She’ll be able to train with fellow rising junior Madisyn Cox, who placed 3rd in the 200 IM as well as 5th in the 400 IM at NCAAs last year. Cox won the 400 IM at the Big 12 Championships last season as well, and she’ll look to challenge for an NCAA title in either if she continues her fast improvement. The Longhorns have an incredible class of freshmen coming in, none of which are elite IMers, so it’s safe to say that D’Innocenzo will likely be able to focus solely on the IM and 200 fly as she heads into her upperclassmen years. With her best times, she looks to be an immediate A finalist in both IMs as well as the 200 fly at the Big 12 Championships level.
You can read more in a release by Texas Longhorns Athletics.
I have to say that I am confused by transfer rules in swimming. This story makes it sound like she is eligible to swim this year without sitting out a year.
I think Madisyn Cox is more than an “NCAA-level scoring threat,” seeing as she was 3rd at the meet in the 200 IM this past season…
TX — You’re totally right, I overlooked that. Whoops. I’ve revised that part!